


Till Sunbeams Find You

by 221b_hound



Series: Guitar Man [60]
Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Fic Graveyard, Gen, John used to be in a band, John's mother died when he was 14, dream - Freeform, john's mother taught him how to play the guitar
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-10-05
Updated: 2013-10-05
Packaged: 2017-12-28 11:21:34
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,416
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/991441
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/221b_hound/pseuds/221b_hound
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It's the anniversary of his mother's death. For the first time in many years, John goes to her grave to catch her up on his life and play her some songs. He falls asleep and has the strangest dream.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Till Sunbeams Find You

**Author's Note:**

> The title is from Dream a Little Dream. The version I know best is by the Mamas and the Papas (original song from 1931).
> 
> Many thanks to Dee Natsuko for information about English graveyards!
> 
> EDIT: Aug 2014. I've edited this slightly to more accurately reflect my take on John's military career, since I'm working on stories about that now and finally have a clear picture of what his service actually was like.

 

 

It was the anniversary – the _other_ anniversary – and for the first time in years, John wasn’t otherwise occupied. He wasn’t on patrol or responding to a medical emergency in the field or on the base. He wasn’t chasing down murderers at Sherlock’s heels. He wasn’t distracting himself from the constant fear that lived in his whole body when that madman was fighting his lone war to dismantle Moriarty’s empire. He wasn’t spending precious time with the woman he adored, or celebrating odd milestones with his amazing extended family, or playing with his band, or having a picnic with his cherished daughter or co-minding the madman’s beautiful son. He was just home, alone, picking at his guitar and thinking of this anniversary of when he’d lost her.

Thinking of Fiona Watson, dead now for more of his life than he’d actually known her, and how her absence was still so keenly felt.

And how, since Sherlock had discovered John’s musical past, and brought it back to him, he had grown to be able to think of his mother without it hurting quite so much. How since Sherlock’s return, and the second return of music and song, he often felt quite close to his mother again after all.

Sherlock was at St Bart’s, conducting some kind of _in situ_ experiment with what Molly had promised was an interesting cadaver. Not a murder victim, but elements of the corpse, she’d suggested, might have future case relevance. Sherlock had dashed off out of the house like it was an early Christmas present. John supposed that it was.

Mary and Nirupa were at another UN conference, with their little girl in tow, five years old now. Growing so fast.

His mother, John knew, would have doted on Violet. She’d have adored Mary, and Nirupa, just as she would have loved Sherlock, surely. Fiona Watson had always had the biggest heart he ever knew of. Even the sainted Mike Stamford, as patient and kind and good-humoured a man as John had ever known, was not so expansively loving as John’s mum had been.

It was a whim, in the end. To say hello. He hadn’t been to her grave since just before leaving on his first deployment with the army. His father was buried with her now. He hadn’t gone to the funeral. Too hard, the way their last exchange had been.

So, with nothing better to do, and a longing to see his mother transmuted into at least the wish to pay his respects, John Watson put his guitar in its case and carried it to the train station and to the town in which he’d grown up.

It was early afternoon when he stood before the grave. It was well maintained, free of lichen and bird droppings. He was surprised to realise that it must be Harry’s doing. Perhaps it wasn’t so surprising. She’d arranged both funerals, after all. He should see his sister again soon, he thought. When Mary and Rupe got back with Violet, do a family lunch or something. Harry’s sobriety had been going well this year.

He gazed at his father’s name, now inscribed below his mother’s. He still didn’t know what to say to him. “You were wrong about me,” still felt too… self-vindicating. It was true, but it didn’t matter, either. Instead, John stood at military ease, gave the name carved in stone a cautious nod, then huffed a sigh.

He reached out to trace his fingers over the first name on that stone, over the words: _Fiona Claire Watson. Beloved wife and mother. Taken suddenly to the arms of the Lord._ Harry had chosen the words, even though she wasn’t a believer. Their mother had been, and Harry, 17 at the time, had thought it was what her mum would have wanted. She’d had to make a lot of decisions that year, because their dad had been in no state to make them. Jack Watson had roared with outrage and fought with Harry over it when it was too late, the stone was carved. Jack Watson had stopped believing in the Lord the day his wife was killed in a random car smash.

“Hey, Mum,” said John into the quiet day.

The wind sighed through trees scattered about the edges of the cemetery, a gentle sound. In the distance, cars hummed along the road.

“So much has happened since I was here last,” he said, “You wouldn’t believe it. I hardly do, and I’ve lived it.”

Birds nearby chirped and hopped among the desiccated remains of flowers, hunting for insects. John smiled.

“After I left you, I was deployed to The Middle East. RAMC first, then the Fifth Northumberland Fusiliers. Good blokes, on the whole. I did good work with them, I think. I saved lives, army and civilian. Not always as a doctor, but out there you take what you can get sometimes. But I think I made a difference, to individuals at least. I got through a couple of tours before I got shot.”

He drew a steadying breath on that. He hadn’t said that aloud to anyone in a long time. The memory of it – of the impact, of being thrown backward into the dirt, of agony and blood and screaming and the hollowness that followed - was still a shock, sometimes.

“I got shot and sent home,” he continued, because the story got so much better from there, “And things were bad for a while, but then I met someone. Sherlock Holmes. He’s brilliant. He’s a bit mad. You’d like him. He’s like the brother I never had, but more than that, too. He found me when I was pretty much lost, and… He gave me purpose again. He gave me a way to make a difference again. He found my music and gave that back to me, too. I owe him so much. Because of him I met Mary, and we have Violet now. She’s so much like you, Mum, our baby girl. And there’s Rupe, of course. And the band.”

 _I’m missing too much_ , John decided, _I’m skipping all the good bits._

So he propped his guitar against the headstone and sat on the trimmed grass in front of it (he didn’t believe in an afterlife and anyway, even if there was one, he didn’t think she’d mind him sitting there. He wanted to keep off the path, such as it was in this crowded cemetery).

John told his mother everything. He talked, not because he thought she could hear him, but because he knew it was good to talk. To say things you should have said, and meant to say, and never got the chance. He talked because he knew it was good, not for the person you’d meant to tell, but for yourself.

Maybe that’s why it had never worked with Ella, when she wanted him to talk. The things she wanted him to talk about were things he needed to say to those absent and to himself, but those things weren't for her to hear. 

John told his mum about the army, and saving lives, and taking them when he must. He told her about getting shot; about returning to London as a fading ghost of a man he’d once been; about Sherlock and how that man, that unexpected friendship, had breathed life back into him. He told her about the serial killer cabbie, the Semtex vest, HOUND, and what a dick Sherlock had been, though he lauged about it now. He told her about rediscovering his music because Sherlock wouldn’t let him hide.

Then he told her about the Fall and the year Away and what it had done to them, how it had remade them both. He told her about Mary, Rupe and Violet, about Mrs Hudson and Ford and his parents, about Greg and Molly and Tad and Collared. About music and songs and love and how he missed her, and how he felt that he’d claimed some of her back again. All because of Sherlock.

All this, so much and more, because of Sherlock, who she would never meet.

“Anyway,” he finished, fetching his guitar out of its case, “I wanted to say thank you – for the music, and everything you gave me before you left. And I miss you, and that I’m okay, Mum. I wasn’t for a long time, but I am now. So much better than okay.”

John smiled. It’s funny, the things you need to say out loud to yourself. He had an amazing friend, an amazing family, an amazing life, and what’s more, he knew he had them, and he appreciated those things.

 _I’m definitely calling Harry this week,_ he decided.

He moved to put his back to the marker, something to rest against between songs. He knew it was only stone, but the pressure on his back was real. He didn’t quite acknowledge it to himself, but it felt a little like she was there, a solid presence behind him.

He strummed, picked out a few notes, and then played _Illuminated_. He played Violet’s lullaby. He played _This Ghost_ , and then, grinning, he played _The Improbable Song_.

John played knowing it was for himself, really, but he indulged in the illusion that Fiona could hear all of his songs about his life and those he loved.

The sun was warm, the graveyard was peaceful and for the first time ever on this anniversary, the day that she had died, he felt at peace, too.

Eventually, his fingers stilled over the strings and he closed his eyes.

He dozed off.

He slept.

He dreamed.

_“There you are, John.”_

_In his dream, John opens his eyes to the sound of that soft Scottish burr, and he grins. “Mum!”_

_He runs towards her, stumbling over his own too-long jeans, because he’s only fourteen but he’s wearing his grown-up clothes. Not that he grew much, but jeez, he was a skinny kid back then, and his jeans and shirt hang too loose on that scrawny frame._

_His mum holds her hands out and catches him as he falls into her arms. His own arms are wrapped tight around her and he hugs and hugs and hugs and hugs her. She’s laughing. “My little bull dog,” she says, ruffling his hair, “You’ve been up to something.”_

_“No,” he promises her, face pressed to her stomach (how is he so short? He’s fourteen, not six, but oh, maybe he is six, right now, this second. Once he realises, he is fourteen again, and he’s of a height with her. )_

_“You have,” she counters, “And you haven’t introduced me to your co-conspirator.”_

_John looks over his shoulder to where she is looking, and Sherlock is there. Sherlock, looking ridiculously young, even though he’s the Sherlock John knows, but he’s maybe eleven. You’d never tell from the suit, but then, the suit hangs large on him too. He’s not quite tall enough for it. His face looks the same, but also young, but it all makes perfect sense so John just grins._

_“This is Sherlock. I told you about him.”_

_“So good to meet you, Sherlock,” says his mother, and her voice is warm and sunny like the perfect summer day._

_“You were born in Edinburgh,” says Sherlock in his direct fashion, but in a higher voice, like the child he is, “But moved to England as a teenager. You get on better with your father than your mother. You’re an only child. You play the guitar. You had ambitions to be a professional musician but gave them up to marry a man less intelligent and less ambitious than yourself. A love match, then. You seem to think the sacrifice worth it. You enjoy being a parent.”_

_“Hark at you, you cheeky beggar,” says Fiona, smiling indulgently, “Clever, like John said. What else do you see?”_

_“Your heart is very large,” says Sherlock, pointing, and they can see the organ in question, glowing like a beacon in her chest, “Large enough that you gave a big piece of it to John, and you still had plenty left over.”_

_They all look at John’s chest, with its own heart, the glow of it pulsing._

_“Oh, he grew most of that himself,” says Fiona, “I just gave him a cutting of mine to start off with.”_

_“Good healthy plant stock,” says Sherlock knowingly. Fiona ruffles Sherlock’s hair too, and instead of grimacing, he looks quite pleased._

_They’re eating biscuits now, the ones John’s mum always made on Saturdays, and they have a cup of hot chocolate each. Sherlock picks a biscuit up with careful good manners, as though mindful of lessons slapped into him, but at the first bite he jams the whole thing in his mouth, and follows it with two more._

_Eleven year old Sherlock is just like Sherlock now, John thinks, only with even less restraint. It makes him laugh._

_“You are a funny one,” says Fiona, piling more biscuits onto Sherlock’s plate, “It’s good you found John, though. My boy’s heart was always big, but it makes him feel things very deeply. That can hurt.  He built a lot of walls, my John, after I died.”_

_“It’s okay, Mum,” John tries to tell her, but the words are tangled up like toffee and fall out of his mouth in a lump, so he has to pick them up and untangle them, like wool. The words spool out, written on the air, and they say: “I kept my heart safe. I saw what happened to big hearts when you died. Dad’s got all smashed up, and Harry’s. I kept my heart safe inside.”_

_Sherlock is watching them, chewing and swallowing, chewing and swallowing, washing the biscuits down with hot chocolate before cramming more in, as though he is wolfing down love. He is listening intently to Fiona Watson all the same._

_"John built such high walls, so close around his heart,” Fiona says to Sherlock, “People would get so near before they found the way barred and they'd knock but he wouldn't hear. And you just climbed over the wall, jumped right down into the centre of his heart and kicked the walls down from the inside.” She beams at him, proud of his achievement._

_Sherlock, cheeks puffed out with biscuit like a greedy squirrel, nods. “I didn’t know that’s what I was doing,” he says, clear as a bell, even though he’s still chewing, “I wanted to get in so I got in. I’ve never met anyone like him before.”_

_“You had walls of your own, Sherlock,” she points out, “And he did the same for you.”_

_Sherlock nods again and swallows hard to clear his mouth. “I wasn’t expecting that. It’s illogical. I climb into him, he climbs into me, that doesn’t make sense.”_

_“Silly, he didn’t climb,” says Fiona, “He just walked through your walls like they weren’t there.”_

_Sherlock nods again. “Yes. Of course. Elementary.” He pauses. "I still don't know how he did that."_

_"Quietly, I'm sure. He was always a stubborn boy, but not a shouter. Even his songs - they were loud, proper rock and roll, but what they said - they didn't shout." She looks at her son. “I’m sorry about the empty house I left for you, John.”_

_John, who has been watching all this time, shakes his head. "That's not what that song means, Mum."_

_"I know sweetie. I know you were just howling in the storm. It was so silent and so loud in that house."_

_“You didn’t mean to go.”_

_“No, sweetie, I didn’t. I wanted to stay and watch you grow up, but look at you. All that growing up you did on your own.”_

_John’s clothes finally fit again, and when he looks, so do Sherlock’s. Sherlock is still eating biscuits, however. He picks one up and nibbles it. And nibbles. And nibbles. And then next thing, he holds up the DNA double helix he has made by nibbling the biscuit._

_“There is a process,” says Sherlock, in his best must-I-explain-everything voice as he turns the helix around to demonstrate his point, “Whereby love is transmitted through DNA. It is a faulty process and not reliable, because while I love Violet I most definitely do not love Harry, and I thoroughly despise your late husband. However, the process clearly goes up the tree as well as down.” And he looks at Fiona meaningfully._

_Fiona laughs and ruffles adult Sherlock’s hair. 'You’re a sweet one. And bright. And funny. And you knocked down all John’s walls and left the way open for others to come in. No wonder my little bull pup adores you.”_

_Sherlock looks at John who is for a moment a little bull pup, all energy and protective will and determination, barking happily, and Sherlock is a bloodhound, a bit surprised at the transformation, but he barks back and then the barks are laughter and they are standing there, themselves again, laughing over the corpse of a broken piano, which is weird of them, they know, but Fiona doesn’t seem to mind._

_"The two of you,” says Fiona indulgently, “Love each other just like brothers should.”_

_Sherlock looks a bit awkward and is suddenly younger again, a gangly teen, and John is fourteen again._

_“Sing for me, will you?” she asks._

_“And I would walk five hundred miles,” sings John in an accent mimicking his mother’s burr._

_“And I would walk five hundred more,” sings Sherlock, in a similar faux Scots accent._

_“Just to be the man who walked a thousand miles to fall down at your door,” they sing together, marching with exaggerated swagger._

_“This is a boring song, friend John,” sings Sherlock to the tune._

_“Then let us sing another one,” John carols back._

_They are dressed as stage-tramps now, like Astaire and Garland, and they are singing Side by Side **, Oh we ain’t got a barrel of mo-ney, maybe we’re ragged and fun-ny,** with the choreography from the movie that Fiona loves, but then Sherlock stands up, throws his arms wide and starts to sing _ Illuminated _. He is pointing at John to show that it is John’s song._

_“Your charming friend,” says Fiona, laughing still, “Is a bit of a show off.”_

_“No, no,” says Sherlock, “Well, yes, but John won’t show off his songs by himself. He hides them from me, you know.” He launches into_ This Ghost _and the rest of John’s repertoire, proudly pointing at John as he does so._

_“Mum,” says John-at-fourteen earnestly, “He's the best and wisest man I've ever known.” And John knows that's not right; it's not what he said back at the empty grave; and Sherlock is smart, but wise? No. Not yet anyway. They are both a very long way from wise._

_Sherlock is waltzing with Fiona, now, and he laughs. “You’re an idiot, John. That’s you. Best and wisest.”_

_“You’re a dear,” says Fiona as Sherlock whirls her around, “A bit of a show off, like I said, but you’re a good boy.”_

_Sherlock beams._

_And John wakes up._

John blinked at the late afternoon sun, and at the shadow that fell across him.

“Do I really need to explain?” said Sherlock.

“You got home,” said John, “Saw I’d taken my guitar, realised the date – or maybe the other way around – and then… did the other things you do to figure out where I’d gone.” He laughed self-deprecatingly, at his failure to make all the connections he knew Sherlock would have made, and also a little embarrassed by the ego of his superego, in those last moments of the dream.

Sherlock extended a hand and John took it. His muscles and joint complained as he got to his feet and he stretched until the ache eased. He turned and patted the headstone.

“You were dreaming,” said Sherlock. He frowned. “You don’t believe in an afterlife,” he noted, leaving worlds unsaid between the two observations.

“No.”  John put his guitar away, hefted up the case and turned to Sherlock with a smile. “I know it was just a dream. Id. Ego. Superego. It doesn’t matter. It was a good dream.”

Sherlock nodded and then bent to place the bunch of roses he’d brought with him on the grave. John watched without comment. Sherlock didn’t say anything about it either. He just turned to leave, and John fell into step beside him and they walked, side by side, to make their way back home to Baker Street.

 


End file.
